A trip to the Blockbuster video store was a weekend event for many families before movies and entire TV series were available from online services.

Beginning in the early 1990s, Owen Sound's first Blockbuster outlet on the westside, and later at the 16th Street East location too, saw parents and their kids pouring in, each choosing the movies they wanted to watch over the weekend.

Five years ago, Blockbuster Canada was drowning in red ink and was forced to close its Owen Sound locations, along with the remaining 251 others across the country. The digital revolution got them.

But two local Blockbuster managers, Phil Davis and Bill Robbins, saw the local video market was still good. They took a chance and started their own venture in the eastside Blockbuster location. Phil and Bill's Video Emporium was born.

Now their lease is up and the friendly, knowledgeable fellows are calling it a day. Costs keep rising and the business has been in slow decline, Robbins explained Tuesday in an interview. They're selling everything at a discount and have discontinued their rentals.

Davis has a notion to keep the business running if he can find smaller, cheaper quarters but nothing's definite. Robbins will be looking for a job in retail.

"It's been such a big part of our lives for so long that so many of our customers, we spent so much time with them, they really are friends as well as customers," Davis said, who continues to smile despite the circumstances.

"A lot of our customers we known them by name when they come in," Robbins added.

Customer Anne-Marie McLeish was "heartbroken" when she heard the store's closing.

"I'm not always right into seeing everything on Netflix and things like that. I'd much prefer to support local business," she said while standing at the counter.

Netflix and other online adversaries have eroded the store's customer base -- a broad mix from teens to senior. Some aren't tech savvy enough to try online streaming, others live outside the city and don't have access to high-speed Internet and some just like coming into the store. Some are cable cutters who found renting movies in the store an inexpensive alternative.

Robbins worked for Blockbuster for 16 years, including a stint as manager of a Scarborough Blockbuster outlet. Davis was with Blockbuster for 11 years.

They've known some customers since they were children, some of whom were hired in later years. When the store opened, eight people including the owners worked there. Two employees remain now.

"When Blockbuster closed, we knew that the writing's on the wall. It's just a matter of how long do you have?" said Davis, acknowledging their video store's number would be up too. "I don't think either of us thought that this would be going 10, 15, 20 years down the road," he said.

"We always knew this wasn't going to be our last job. Knock on wood."

But what's happened to the video retailers is also happening to retail stores generally, in Davis's view.

"Personally, I see 20 years down the road there being almost no physical retail, it should be almost all online shopping," Davis said. He said he hopes he's wrong because there are a lot of jobs in retail.

In its heyday, the Blockbuster stores were hopping.

"There are a lot of families that this was sort of an outing for them," Davis said. "I would say 10 or 15 years ago, you got used to on a Friday or a Saturday night you'd have tonnes of families coming in. So it was a whole family outing to go pick out your movies."

A former employee back in the Blockbuster days came to the counter with a stack of movies to buy. Robbins removed each DVD from its plastic case and placed each in a machine which rubbed away scratches before selling them.

"I know that a lot of people will miss the atmosphere," Alison Ironmonger said. "My mom, she comes in here not only for the movies but for the socializing and seeing familiar faces. And I know I'll miss them too."

Something's being lost when your only real option for home rentals is via online transactions, she said.

"Here you get an actual recommendation. They've watched the movies, they've seen them. They know the reviews. It's not just some no-name Joe Blow saying yeah, this is a good movie you should watch it. Plus if they're wrong you can come back and let them know," she said with a laugh that showed she was kidding.

The store will close just before Christmas. If Davis's interest in opening a smaller store turn into solid plans, he hopes to be open by March or so.